Its been so busy here in the Sewing Studio which is brilliant and the diary is filling up quickly.

Theres a new craft club starting here on Monday at 10am-12pm. It would be lovely to see you there…..

The Crochet workshops have already started back. This runs every Saturday morning 10am-12pm. There’s no need to book, just come along and learn new skills. They are a friendly bunch that progress very quickly ………

The Kids Sewing Bee has also started back and as ever they are all enthusiastic and creative. We’ve had cowls, pencil cases and pouches being made and rag dolls and doorstops in progress……

My adult workshops have also been busy and so far this year we’ve had rag ruggging, beginners sewing and the Free Motion Embroidery workshop…….

The Craft & Chat and Making Memories Quilting Group have also started back 😍…..

Its been a few weeks now since the Haberdashery closed its doors and I’m finding time to breathe. I have to admit it’s been a shock to my system having spare time but I’ve had the time to sit down and plan next years courses and workshops.

The most popular workshops are back as well as a few new ones thrown in too.

All the dates and details can be found here at http://www.simplyneedlecraft.com/workshopsclasses.html

There’s been quite a few workshops that have took place in the last few weeks so I’ll run through them and show you the projects.

Paper Pieced Christmas Stocking workshop last week…..

Free motion embroidery workshop last week …..

The Textile Art Canvas Workshop this week…..

Thread Painting Landscape Workshop this week …..

We also had our Craft & Chat evening and the Making Memories Quilting Group…..

The children in the Sewing Bee have also been extremely busy too making quilts, advent calendars, bows, bags and baskets…

So I’m keeping busy making sure everyone gets creative 😊

thanks for reading, make sure you pop over to the website to look at all the new dates.

yes it’s my favourite part of the building. It’s a place that’s full of creativity, laughter and proud moments.

So this blog post is dedicated to everyone’s hard work.

Lets start with my groups that entered the Festival of Quilts…

Lets start with my younger group. This is a group made up of three girls, Hollie, Dolcie and Ellie and one boy Luke.

Their entry to the competition was a quilt called Up, up & away. They have been working hard since Christmas to get the quilt finished before the deadline.

They used applique, weaving, embellishing and quilting techniques. They received a highly commended in the competition……

My older group is made up of four girls, Elizabeth, Hope, Mia and Molly. Their quilt was named Natures Wardrobe. They used hand dying, raw edge appliqué, free motion stitching and free motion quilting techniques. The win 3rd place in the competition….

Both groups have worked extremely hard and I’m so proud of them.

Both quilts are on display in the shop for another week…..

Carrying on with the Sewing Studio ….

I’ve been joined by three of my stitchers over a week to make a patchwork and quilted lap quilt…..

We’ve quilted bags from two from my stitchers…..

I’ve had another two finishing off their bunting….

We’ve had four door hangers, hot air balloons …….

We had ten book marks……

And we’ve started fabric weaving baskets that still are in working progress….

The adults have also had a try with Christmas stocking and trees…..more workshops dates for this will be announced soon……

I’ve also got new dates and workshops available in thread painting miniatures….

I’ve got issues with the Simply Needlecraft website at the moment but will hopefully be back up and running over the weekend.

Id like to thank everyone who has shown support and caring words towards my son Ben. I can say he’s still a bit bumped and bruised and strapped up but in typical Ben style …….he’s still smiling …..

We are on count down now for the Festival of Quilts which is on Thursday 10th August. The shop will be closed on this day as we are all going to Birmingham.

Lets start with the adults and the free motion embroidery. I had four lovely ladies join me in the sewing studio to master the techniques of free motion sketching. This workshop is extremely popular and books up very quickly so I will be arranging more very soon…..

lots of new stock in recently, Stylecraft Candy Swirl…

New fabric by Robert Kaufman…..

The Butterick half price sale has started and runs until the end of August……. make sure you don’t miss out…

Right let’s get down to the sewing bee, we’ve had pillow pals galore…

Herds of elephants….

Bookmarks….

Neck cushions ……

And finally PJ’s

Ive been busy hand stitching lately, something I’ve not done for a while but I’m finding it very relaxing. Using upcyled, vintage fabrics and lace to make a botanical book……

I’m also getting for my first exhibition with Midlands Textile Forum at Bishops Castle…….not long now…

The Sewing Studio is the heart of Simply Needlecraft for me. From adults workshops to children’s workshop, from knitting to crochet to sewing to craft and chat ………. oooopppps I forgot to share to the photos on fb of our last evening. So here they are…..

Its been a busy time for the Sewing Bee too as the 8-12ys have been making appliqué cushions……

Owls…….

Lampshades …….

T-shirts……

Neck cushions ……..

Tapestry……..

And for the 12-16yrs groups it been all about pj bottoms…….

The Sewing Studio was also home to the Mother & Daughter Sewing class too. This is one of my favourite workshops, where mother and daughters team up to make an item. This months class focused on cushion making…..

I’ve been busy working on my own Textile Art and coursework…….you can keep up to date by visiting https://stitchedbyami.com/

This blog post is a mixture of new stock, events and the Sewing Bee, so let’s get started.

Ok so you may remember we were at Sainsbury’s recently as a part of their Street Store event.

Braced with needles, threads and plenty of Suffolk puffs me and my loyal team headed to Sainsbury’s to get young people into sewing and embellishing clothes.

We had a wonderful time and even recruited a new young man into our Sewing Bee…..

Running on the same weekend it was Derbyshire Open Arts where the shop was turned into a gallery ….

Our monthly Craft & Chat Night took place last week and again filled with a lovely bunch of crafters. They run on the first Thursday of every month 6.00-8.30pm and costs £5 which includes cakes, tea and coffee. If you would like to join us just pop along.

On Monday this week our Sewing Bee group finished their cushions and our newest member joined us…….

The Tuesday group our getting to grips with patchwork which is great for practicing sewing straight lines……

Now time for new stock and I have to confess we have started to have our Christmas fabrics in, plus new patterns and trimmings…..

Don’t forget I also run workshops in various different techniques and you can find them all on the website. Please note there is only one more beginners quilting pencilled in at the moment until Autumn as I’m snowed under with other commitments….

You can catch us at Sainsbury’s this Saturday morning working with Hubbub to get little stitchers sewing and adding embellishments to clothes…..find details here

It’s also Derbyshire Open Arts this weekend. This year is my first year of taking part of this festival which covers Derbyshire. The festival starts on Saturday and runs until the 4th June.

I will be here on Sunday and Monday to talk to visitors. I’ll be showing you my inspiration, techniques and methods.

We are also open as usual on Saturday where you can view my work.

Hours are….

Saturday – 9-4pm

Sunday – 10-3pm

Monday – 10 – 3pm

There is also a craft market running on the Saturday hosted by Curly Magpie & Friends.

Ok so events that have already taken place over the last week or so……

we had the lovely Maria Dent, Felt Artist with us to run a full day workshop in Landscape Felting.

We had an amazing turn out with lots of beautiful results. We will be talking to Maria very soon to arrange more dates…..

On Saturday we had our long waited Young Quilters Event.

We invited children between 6-18yrs to join us in the Sewing Studio to take part in this great event which allowed them to get free membership to the Quilters Guild. Again we had an amazing turnout. We shall be adding more dates to the Guilds list very soon….

As you can see we’ve been so busy and I apologise for the lack of blog entries.

Thank you for your support. I couldn’t have be able to do this without you.

Our monthly evening of Craft & Chat took place this week and as usual a lovely bunch of people. We meet monthly to craft, drink tea, eat cake and a good old gossip. The first Thursday of every month, so if your interested in joining us please come along….

The very popular free motion class took place this week. I love this workshop…..